One goal identified by Austin's urban rail planners is to connect the city's growth centers in the Central Corridor.

The Central Corridor is part of the Project Connect regional transit plan that aims to provide residents with high-capacity transit options such as urban rail. The Central Corridor Advisory Group is leading the urban rail planning efforts and in November will recommend to City Council a priority sub-corridor for the placement of rail. Kyle Keahey, Project Connect's urban rail lead, said the CCAG will likely recommend a sub-corridor that connects the most growth centers.

"The bigger challenge that we have is ... how do we integrate a transit system within these dense urban cores in such a way [that] we're not increasing congestion, where in fact we are increasing mobility," he said.

Keahey said the reason for using centers in the planning process for urban rail is because these are the areas in which the city wants to concentrate growth with higher density and mixed-use development.

"There's the connecting transit element that this project would bring to the equation," he said.

One of those centers, Mueller, has been involved in rail discussions since the late 1990s when the Mueller master plan was being completed. At the time, the city was preparing for the 2000 light rail election that eventually failed.

Greg Weaver, executive vice president of Catellus Development Group, Mueller's master developer, said Mueller is about 40 percent developed. He said the Mueller master plan also allows Catellus to increase the density of projects if urban rail were to go through the development.

"If we go build everything out at Mueller over the next five years and we don't know rail's coming here, there's a missed opportunity to go increase that density—to me that would be the biggest impact," he said.

Weaver said a proposed route that would include Mueller would also serve the greater northeast corridor, including the University of Texas football stadium, surrounding communities and several medical facilities, including the proposed Dell Medical School at The University of Texas.

"It is a big destination, and then you look at all these other things: the medical corridor, the [Hwy.] 290 corridor, the link-up to the [MetroRail], all these other components that are on here [indicate] that this [route] should be a lot bigger than Mueller," he said.

Austin Community College is renovating the former JCPenney store at Highland Mall where it will have a total of 200,000 square feet of instructional space to serve 6,200 students when it opens in fall 2014, ACC President Richard Rhodes said. Having access to urban rail that connects to other centers in the Central Corridor would be advantageous to ACC's students, he said. ACC began a co-enrollment program with UT this fall and would also be involved in training the workforce at the medical school.

"Being part of the conversation is critical," he said.

RedLeaf Properties is working with ACC to develop the remainder of the Highland site, mostly for residential use, RedLeaf Manager Matt Whelan said. Because Highland has access to US 183, Hwy. 290 and I-35, it offers an opportunity to create a complete network of transit options, and RedLeaf is supportive of urban rail, he said.

"Our focus is to support the [transit options] that are there and convenient for students, employees, shoppers and residents," Whelan said.

The Capitol complex, bordered by 10th, Lavaca and Trinity streets and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, represents roughly 13,000 employees. Aundre Dukes, real estate portfolio manager for the Texas Facilities Commission, which is the state's real estate and construction manager, said the TFC is evaluating the state's underused real property assets to repurpose them.

One option is to replace three underused parking lots to create 1.3 million square feet of new office space. He said he has been providing feedback to the urban rail planning team on where rail makes sense to best serve the complex.

"The Capitol complex is a major employment center and tourist destination," he said.